Meetings the Needs of Gifted Students

• At the Top of the Class or Outside of It?
• Learning Environments for Gifted Students

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Who are gifted students and what sort of schooling should they get? Both of these questions are troubling and troublesome.

In contrast to their fellow Prime Minister's Award recipients who work with special needs students, the teachers who work most often with gifted students consider the use of labels to distinguish one group from another to be destructive.

Labels set kids apart from their peers in ways that can have very negative effects, says Susan Quinn, a music teacher at Holy Heart of Mary Regional High School in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador. "I think teachers must take responsibility for the social development of their students," she explains. Separating them from others on the basis of special skills they have in particular areas is not always effective.

Students who are especially gifted in some areas often get short shrift in others, adds Clarence Button, who teaches sciences and technology at O'Donel High School in Mount Pearl, Newfoundland and Labrador. "There is a tendency to assume that because students are acing math and history that everything else is progressing as well. In contrast, their literacy skills or appreciation of the liberal arts and humanities may be severely lacking. They may dislike these topics simply because they feel incompetent in comparison with their strong subjects."

Finally, labelling students cuts them off from their peers. "The classic example is the poor child in Grade 2 who has to sit alone doing 'gifted' things while all her classmates are playing Happy Scissors," says Peter Gardiner, who teaches biology and psychology at St. Michaels University School in Victoria, British Columbia.

In addition, people use the term gifted without any real understanding of what it means. "That is what troubles me most," says Gardiner. "We all feel we can pick these students out but we couldn't explain what criteria we are using to do so."

Is it enough to say they are gifted because they are succeeding? "The problem with that," explains Gardiner, "is that we get periodic reminders that we have missed someone. Every once in a while a student who nobody particularly noticed as gifted while they were in school goes on to do great things."

Teachers have a responsibility to uncover students' special abilities, according to Button. "If you can find the area where a student, any student, can excel, then you have the basis to build bridges to other things. The methods are the same!"

And the basis to overcome stereotypes, adds Quinn. "When I tour Europe with my music students, I am always impressed with how casually the students there will go from the choir loft to the rugby field to the chemistry lab. Here in North America we have stereotypes that make kids uncomfortable doing that."

It was for this reason that Quinn was particularly grateful to see the hockey team show up at choir practice one day. It happened a few years ago when Holy Heart went from being a girls school to being co-educational. "I needed to get boys in the choir and I told the girls to go out and find boys who would be comfortable standing up and singing with them. They came back with the hockey team."

For Quinn, who teaches some extraordinarily talented musicians, teaching "jocks" to sing was deeply rewarding. Equally important, it was rewarding for her star students as well. "I have a chamber choir that competes at a very high level but I insist that those students perform with the larger concert choir as well. The concert choir is more like the larger society, and the satisfaction that comes when a group like that comes together to sing a simple but beautiful song can't be had any other way."

Finding an area a student can excel in and then showing him or her that this creates opportunities elsewhere is an approach that can be applied to teaching any class, agrees Button. Ultimately, however, he believes, "some kids think differently and that difference allows them to excel. I am very motivated by statistics that show that we haven't been as good as we should be at identifying and helping these kids in Canada."

Teachers can figure out how to use the resources they have effectively, says Button. "People get upset, and rightfully so, when they see 7 gifted kids in Advanced Placement physics and 30 others crowded into a regular chemistry lab." There are ways, such as schools combining resources, to get around these things, he says. Ultimately, it is in everyone's interest to do so. "We shouldn't feel threatened by extraordinary performers," he explains. Instead, it is the mark of a smart society that we provide them with opportunities to excel (see "IB and AP: Two Opportunities for Advancement").

"Ultimately, any discussion of giftedness comes around to the thorny issue of privilege," says Gardiner. This comes with the territory for Gardiner, since he teaches at a school where a certain level of academic performance and the ability to pay the tuition are required. "I get some flack because of where I teach and I can live with that. But the inescapable lesson you learn in a place like this is that money doesn't necessarily equal a caring upbringing."

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At the Top of the Class or Outside of It?

Whether it is a reflection of privilege or simply an effective way to meet gifted students needs, the question of whether or not segregated classes should be created for these students is not going to go away. There are an increasing number of private schools that claim to offer students an advantage. At the same time, supporters of public schools argue that the public system should provide for the special needs of gifted students. Many people argue that special programs, such as the International Baccalaureate (IB), Advanced Placement (AP) and even late French immersion, offer extra challenges and focussed attention so students can perform at a higher level.

And these discussions are not just about the pluses and minuses of different teaching philosophies. There is a tangible payoff for students because many universities give advanced standing to students who have completed IB or AP courses. Many parents also believe that a balanced résumé, with both academic and artistic aspects, as well as volunteer experience and second-language abilities, is favoured by the admission departments of many universities, particularly elite ones.

The increasing pressure to get admitted to university programs with more stringent standards will probably continue to create demand for special options for strong students, says Quinn. The various options fall under two broad approaches, she explains. One is to segregate on the basis of subjects. Students who are particularly strong in chemistry are placed in an advanced class. The other approach is to create a special program in which the stronger students take all their classes together.

Teachers are responsible for the social development of students and not just academics, continues Quinn. "With my concert choir, I have as broad a group of students as possible and there are clear benefits for all students from working together," she explains.

Special programs have good and bad effects, says Richard Hechter of The Collegiate at the University of Winnipeg. "The school where I teach was created as a feeder for the university and there is no doubt that students come here with the expectation that they will be well prepared for university. But there are some kinds of competitiveness and other pressures that aren't helpful."

"I have to remind my students that while life is competitive, everything we do is not," adds Peter Gardiner. It is extremely valuable for all students to be able to do some things that aren't going to count," in the sense that they become part of their qualifications. "You should be able to have learning experiences that are personal and have only intrinsic value."

There are two different kinds of reasons for undertaking any program, he says. "This program may be of help to me in getting into university or it may help me become a better person but not produce some objective qualification. In assessing anything, whether it is an advanced program or whether to play a particular sport or do volunteer work, both considerations should come into play."

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Learning Environments for Gifted Students

Regardless of how the issue of special programs is resolved, what should a teacher do to help the gifted students in his or her classes today? They should do many of the same things they would do for any student. "I wouldn't change my teaching style one bit if I were not teaching gifted students," says Gardiner. The issues he emphasizes to his "high flyers" — such as intellectual honesty, challenging yourself and the importance of "training" your intellect — are just as relevant in any classroom. "The thing that I would change would be the level of the content."

For Button, the key issue is to determine where a student's giftedness lies. "All students have special abilities," he explains, and, generally, students tend to be enthusiastic about things that require those abilities. "No matter what it is, this interest will eventually tie into broader concerns," says Button. "A student of mine was fascinated with carpentry," he explains. "I knew that pursuing that interest would eventually lead him to mathematical concepts, and that became the opening I used."

Gardiner agrees about starting with students' strengths. "I don't think there is much point in forcing students to do things they really aren't interested in," adds Gardiner. In extreme cases, when a student isn't interested in education at all, he believes there is some merit in just letting them go. "Having grown up in the British education system, I can tell you that one of the most impressive things about the North American system is that it allows people to go back and redo things in which they didn't see value the first time around."

What really distinguishes the students who typically get called "gifted" is not that they have special interests but what they can do when given their head in an area that really challenges and excites them. Leaving aside all labels," says Button, "there are some students who just gobble up the concepts, making intuitive leaps that get them past challenges that others struggle with. Some people have this sort of ability in just one area, some have it in several areas, and some kids, amazingly, are just really good at everything."

And that is where the more challenging content comes in, says Gardiner. "What I object to is the striving for mediocrity that is typical of too many programs," he explains. All students, including star performers, deserve a school environment that allows those who want to learn to learn — to challenge their intellectual capacity.

But these students are simultaneously under and overestimated, adds Gardiner. Even the ones who are good at everything will ultimately reach a point where they will struggle someday. "Because they have this intuitive ability, they have often not developed good study skills," he explains. "The classic case is the parent who calls to complain that their child has always done very well in school, so why is he doing so poorly now that he is in grade X. The answer is that he or she has been coasting along on intuitive abilities for years."

This is particularly important in skills-based learning, remarks Quinn. "If you have the date for the Battle of Hastings or the fall of Constantinople wrong, all you need to do is correct that one thing," she explains. "That isn't necessarily an easy thing to do but it is a lot easier than if you have been doing mathematics wrong and you pretty much have to reprogram yourself."

The skills are crucial because they become the tools kids can use to teach themselves, adds Quinn. People regularly learn how to sing or play instruments without knowing how to read music, she points out. "I have kids who have been singing in choirs for years without any idea of how to read music. But on the basis of their singing skill I can teach them to read music, and everybody in my choirs does learn."

For Button, skills development comes in the context of challenging, multidisciplinary projects. In recent years, he has been leading student groups taking part in national and international robotics and other technology competitions. "This creates a culture something like a country garden, where every plant has its own individual requirements for growth," he explains. Development of the robot is the defined goal but there are, in fact, a whole array of different tasks required to achieve it. Funds need to be raised, the project needs to be administered and publicized, all sorts of computer technology needs to be learned.

Competitions are valuable because they are such a major intellectual and social challenge. "It isn't just adults who underestimate gifted students; they do it to themselves," he explains. "Robots really trigger results — when something they do gets their colleagues, teachers, parents and other students excited, they will find it exciting, too."

One of the key skills that students need to learn is how to explain things. If you ask students "What is a car?" they will often start with factoids and minutiae they have learned, says Gardiner. "They rarely start with something general such as 'a car is a mode of transportation.' You have to teach them to start with the general and move to the particular."

"I tell them to imagine they are explaining something to an intelligent but uninformed person," he says. Gardiner has developed this basic skill of clear expression to the point that it becomes a valuable tool for students to teach themselves and others (see "Writing Densely to Communicate Clearly").

The question then becomes how far can they go? Gardiner encourages his students to think of what they are doing in school as intellectual training. "When you train, not every performance is a competition," he explains. He encourages his students to think of regular performances as a way to evaluate themselves and to strengthen skills.